MOTOR SPORTS : LAZIERS ARE ALL BROKEN UP MOM AND SON ARE HAPPY OVER INDY DESPITE INJURIES.

Byline: Associated Press 

When Buddy Lazier, recuperating from a broken back, limped to the podium in Indianapolis Monday night with the help of a cane to accept the accolades and more than $1.3 million for his victory in Sunday's Indianapolis 500, his proud mom was sitting there, next to a pair of crutches.

Lazier was injured in a crash in March at Phoenix International Speedway, while Diane Lazier blew out her knee five weeks ago when her son's dog, a 70-pound Labrador Retriever named Indiana Jones, leaped on her unexpectedly.

Bob Lazier, Buddy's dad and the 19th-place finisher in the 1981 Indy, was at the track to see his son's biggest victory. But Diane was back home in Vail, Colo., watching on TV.

``She was really excited, especially when I put him on my cellular (telephone) to her before he even got out of the car,'' the father said. ``I think everybody was crying.''

Mrs. Lazier decided she had to be in Indianapolis for the awards dinner and flew in Monday, just in time to see her oldest son honored.

Pity Petty:Kyle Petty has fallen on hard times since winning the Miller 500 last June at Dover, Del.

Going into this weekend as the defending champion, Petty has recorded only two top-10 finishes since and has none yet this season.

One positive note is that Petty, the son of longtime NASCAR Winston Cup star Richard Petty, is currently 18th in the season standings, ahead of 15 other drivers who have had at least one top-10 finish.

Unser history: Johnny Unser, the only member of his family in this year's Indianapolis 500, never even took the green flag because of a broken transmission.

That left him last in the 33-car field, but the latest of five Unsers who have participated at Indy shouldn't feel too bad.

His Uncle Bobby, a three-time Indy winner, also finished 33rd in his rookie season, finishing two laps before crashing.

Uncle Al was much more fortunate as a rookie in 1965, finishing ninth and completing 196 of the 200 laps. Cousin Al Unser Jr. was 10th in his Indy debut in 1983, running out of fuel after 192 laps.

Johnny's father, Jerry, who was killed in practice at Indy in 1959 when his son was only 7 months old, crashed and finished 31st, failing to complete a lap in 1958, his only start in the famed event.

IRL first:The first season of the new Indy Racing League is over after just three events.

Tony George, president of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and founder of the IRL, has decreed that the Indy 500 will be the finale of the new Indy-car series each year.

What that means is that the races Aug. 18 at Loudon, N.H., and Sept. 15 at Las Vegas, Nev., will be part of the 1997 championship.

Scott Sharp and Indy-car rookie Buzz Calkins tied for the first IRL title.

``This is a unique championship,'' said Sharp, also a two-time SCCA Trans-Am champion. ``There's only one time you can be a first-time champion of the IRL.''

Sharp's car will now be eligible to carry No. 1 because team-owner A.J. Foyt won the first IRL owners' title.

The secret:Butch Miller knows the reason he has won two straight events at Colorado National Speedway: It's the restaurant he ate at the night before.

The somewhat superstitious Miller won an American Speed Association stock car race on the three-eighths-mile oval two years ago, then took the first NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series event there last year.

``We have a restaurant, and I can't tell you the name of it because I don't remember, but it's up on this little hill in Denver and it overlooks the city,'' Miller said. ``We ate there before the ASA race and we ate there before the truck race and we will eat there Friday night.''

The sixth truck race of the season was scheduled for Saturday night.

Eat up:Race fans know how to eat. Just check out the numbers for the past two weeks of racing action at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

From the time practice opened for the all-star weekend of The Winston Select to the end of Sunday's Coca-Cola 600 at the Concord, N.C., track, people consumed 120,000 hot dogs.

Charlotte's shopping list also included 12 tons of ground beef - enough for about 72,000 one-third-pound hamburgers - 7,500 stuffed chicken breasts, 1,760 pounds of deli meat, a 48-foot trailer full of potato and tortilla chips, 18,750 gallons of Coca-Cola products, 100,000 cans of beer and 24,000 16.9-ounce bottles of water.

``It takes a staff of over 1,400 people to deliver this volume of product to the fans,'' said Joe Phelps, food and beverage director for the speedway.

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Photo

Photo: Kyle Petty, shown after a win last year, has had a d isappointing 1996, with no top-10 finishes.

Associated Press